Plot
At dawn on September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda members Ziad Jarrah, Saeed al-Ghamdi, Ahmed al-Nami, and Ahmed al-Haznawi pray in a Newark, New Jersey hotel before boarding United Airlines Flight 93, bound for San Francisco. Among the passengers are Tom Burnett, Todd Beamer, Jeremy Glick, Richard Guadagno, Louis J. Nacke II, Lauren Grandcolas, and Mark Bingham. Air traffic controllers lose contact with American Airlines Flight 11 which diverts toward New York City while United 93 is delayed due to heavy traffic. ATCs realize that Flight 11 has been hijacked after hearing Mohamed Atta transmitting. United 93 is cleared for take off and passes New York. Flight 11 then flies into the World Trade Center's North Tower and United Airlines Flight 175 is also hijacked, flying into the South Tower.
As United 93 reaches its cruising altitude, while passengers are served breakfast, Jarrah hesitates to start the hijacking. An ACARS message is sent from First Officer LeRoy Homer's wife, asking if he is fine, followed by a warning of the WTC attacks and to beware of cockpit intrusion. After Nami unsuccessfully urges Jarrah to attack, an impatient Haznawi prepares his artificial bomb in the lavatory. Ghamdi grabs flight attendant Deborah Welsh at knifepoint, as passenger Mark Rothenberg is mortally stabbed by Haznawi. As Haznawi and Nami force passengers to the back of the plane, Ghamdi fatally stabs both pilots, but not in time to prevent them from transmitting a mayday call, and slits Welsh's throat as Jarrah takes the controls. Grandcolas (an emergency medical technician) tends to dying Rothenberg as the hijackers celebrate news of the WTC attack. Jarrah steers the plane towards Washington, D.C., intending to fly the plane into the United States Capitol, as flight attendants Sandra Bradshaw and CeeCee Lyles find Rothenberg dead. Bradshaw sees the hijackers moving the pilots' and Welsh's bodies, overheard by the passengers.
American Airlines Flight 77, also hijacked, flies into the Pentagon. FAA National Operations Manager Ben Sliney decides to shut down all US air space and grounds all flights. On United 93, passengers learn of the other attacks from family members via airphone. Realizing the hijackers are on a suicide mission, Burnett, Bingham, Beamer, Glick, Guadagno, Nacke, Grandcolas form a plan to retake the plane, with assistance from Bradshaw, Lyles and the flight crew, and gather weapons. They learn that passenger Donald Greene is a licensed pilot and that passenger Andrew "Sonny" Garcia is a former air traffic controller. As they plan, Haznawi and Nami anxiously realize that they are losing control of the situation. Passenger Christian Adams, attempting to counsel appeasement, is restrained by other passengers. The passengers pray and make their final calls to loved ones.
After Beamer urges the group to act, stating, "Let's roll", the passengers charge Haznawi and subdue him. Nami alerts Jarrah and Ghamdi to the revolt; Bingham kills Haznawi by bludgeoning him with a fire extinguisher and Nacke declares the bomb to be a fake. Jarrah rocks the plane to disrupt the revolt as Nami attempts to keep the passengers at bay with a serving cart, Mace and a fire extinguisher, but the passengers persist and overpower him; Glick kills Nami. Jarrah and Ghamdi realize that they will not reach their target, and argue whether to crash the plane rather than cede control, as the passengers batter the cockpit door with the cart. Ghamdi tries to hold the door with an axe, but the passengers weaken the door, Jarrah puts the aircraft into a steep dive, just as the passengers breach the cockpit. The passengers and two remaining hijackers fight over the controls as United 93 inverts and crashes into a Shanksville, Pennsylvania field, killing everyone aboard: the film immediately cuts to black as the plane impacts with the ground.
Title cards state that authorities were only given the order to shoot down hijacked planes after United 93 had crashed, and that airspace was closed until further notice. The final card reads, "Dedicated to the memory of all those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001".